Playing His Part
by HopeyMcHope
Summary: In order to support the happiness of his friends, all Futoshi had to do was give up any hope of being treated like an equal.


Futoshi loved everybody in Squad 13. They were the only friends he had known in the world, and he thought the world of them.

There had been changes to who he knew and how well he knew them over the years, of course, because other parasites had a tendency to be taken away from the group during their time in the garden. Yet those losses only strengthened the bonds he felt with those who stayed. He watched some of them struggle through the tests or the training on the Franxx, but even though Futoshi knew full well that any of them could be taken away at any time, he was never able to lose his empathy and attachment to the other children surrounding him.

That's why, as a young boy, Futoshi cried for every single one that left. Eventually, even those who remained grew weary of seeing him cry every time. They started to leave him alone when someone else was taken from the garden. They didn't want the burden of his emotions on them. "Just let him get it out," he heard one of the boys say once. He couldn't even remember who'd said it anymore, yet he'd never forgotten the implication of the words.

The group dynamics shifted a lot between the garden and Cerasus — it was the biggest adjustment he'd experienced to date. Some of his friends didn't make the cut to become pilots. He watched others struggle, barely making it through. And in the end, he'd even gained a brand-new friend — Zero Two, who'd grown to feel like she was just as much a part of the team as anyone who'd been there from the start.

Getting Zero Two fully integrated into the group took some patience, to say the least. The others would push her away from them frequently. They'd mock differences in her appearance. They'd treat her like she was beneath them. At least Zero Two always had Hiro; she was never completely isolated.

Futoshi felt strong pangs of sympathy for Zero Two during those times. Sure, she was _more_ different than he was, but... the others always called Futoshi fat. It was "fatty" or "fatso" or whatever they felt like this week. It was usually Zorome who was on his case, but sometimes it was Futoshi or Miku tossing off a quick jab at his size.

Regardless of who it was, the rest of the squad smiled and laughed along. They laughed, and they grinned, and that made Futoshi feel like they were mocking him just as hard as Zorome was. Sometimes, Futoshi tried to laugh it off. Most of the time, he got angry.

But he was the only one. Nobody else cared. Nobody stopped it.

When Zero Two got insulted for her differences, she could always turn to Hiro. It was that way for most of Squad 13, actually; nearly neveryone in the squad had someone they felt close to. Sometimes they even had more than one person.

Even before Zero Two jointed the group, Hiro had Goro and Ichigo consistently by his side. Those three were close for as long as Futoshi could remember. Zorome and Miku fought a lot, but they really cared about each other, too. And Mitsuru had... Kokoro.

When the squad was first officially formed, Futoshi was partnered with Kokoro. Then, the morning after Zero Two and Hiro first piloted Strelizia together, the group had breakfast together. Zero Two showed up, sat down with Hiro, and proceeded to _feed_ him, of all the crazy things. Before Futoshi could fully register how much he wanted that to happen to _him_ , Kokoro came over, sat down on his lap, and made that wish instantly come true.

For a time after that, he thought that he'd found someone he could be close to the way that some of the others had. He talked to Kokoro about his feelings. He opened up to her and spoke to her alone, in private, about whatever was on his mind. And she would smile and support him, often agreeing with whatever he said. Ultimately, though, that was just an act. She'd been _trying_ to invest in the partnership the way that he had, but it wasn't going to happen. She just... didn't look at him the same way he looked at her. She couldn't. That's why she'd broken up their partnership in order to team with Mitsuru.

At the time, it had devastated him. It took a few days for him to recover, but he knew he had to do whatever he could to make the team happy.

Plus there was the fact that, after a few days of his crying, the others had gone from sympathetic to bored and annoyed yet again.

 _Of course_ he supported them. _Of course_ he was glad that Mitsuru was no longer one of the few outsiders in the group. _Of course_ he wanted Kokoro to do whatever she had to do to be happy. But it meant that Futoshi now _was_ one of those outsiders that Mitsuru used to be. And selfishly, he wished things had stayed as they were, with only Mitsuru and Ikuno on the outside.

Futoshi knew that he shouldn't think that way about his friends. They were everything he had, and carrying such a cruel wish in his heart made him feel sick inside. He did his best to push it from his mind whenever it forced its way into his thoughts. Yet, regardless of those efforts, he now felt more isolated from the group than Mitsuru had ever been.

Futoshi wasn't just one of only two who had nobody else to confide in or talk to during the quiet hours around the dorms. He was now the only one who was also regularly mocked, insulted, and belittled when the group was together. Constantly hearing about his weight carried its own, distinct kind of weight. It made him feel like everyone thought him to be inferior to them. It made him wonder if _that_ was why Kokoro didn't want to partner with him. _Maybe that's why she couldn't connect with me_ , he decided. _Mitsuru is so fit and thin. And I'm... not._

That was why he'd started the "diet." He'd been reading about them in some of the books that were sitting around in the various rooms within Mistilteinn. Unfortunately, the diet didn't seem to change his weight quickly enough, so he progressed to making himself throw up after each meal. He figured that if the key to dieting was to eat less food, then it'd be even better to not eat. He'd shove a spoon into his throat after dinner and vomit up the meal he'd just had. He knew he wasn't supposed to waste food, but m _aybe_ , if he just lost enough weight, he'd get to be accepted as a real equal by the others. Maybe he'd even find someone... the way most of them already had.

By this point, Futoshi was piloting with Ikuno. He could tell that she was dealing with the same kind of isolation, and yet... they couldn't really talk about it. He tried to bring it up. He tried to share his feelings with her. Yet Ikuno was quiet, reserved, and consistently kept her feelings in check. By comparison, Futoshi was quick to everything — joy, anger, sadness — and he never seemed able to hold Ikuno's attention when he tried to talk to her. She was always disinterested. It made him start to appreciate how much Kokoro had pretended to care. At least she'd _faked_ it. Ikuno couldn't connect with him emotionally, and he couldn't really connect to her easily while piloting. They both had to let their minds wander in order to make the connection work.

There was nothing to be done about it, though. They were the two outsiders, and the rules of the Franxx system demanded that they stick together. He could only try to improve himself in the hopes that someone would at last embrace him as an equal.

And then came the meal they'd all cooked for themselves — the one where Zorome got on his case about how he _wanted_ Futoshi to be fat. Zorome had told him how being a "fatty" really suited him, and he'd gotten angry after Futoshi's diet. He was genuinely _angry_! To top it all off, Zorome announced to the entire group exactly what Futoshi had been doing to try and lose weight. He didn't know why, but Futoshi felt embarrassed when they heard that he was forcing himself to throw up. He assumed the guilt was caused by how the adults had warned them to never waste food — yet here he was, disobeying that rule flagrantly.

Everyone in the squad looked shocked at first, but only for a few seconds. They were so quick to simply revert to laughing at Zorome's insults or just start talking to the person next to them... maybe he shouldn't have been maybe Futoshi had overestimated how much the squad even cared about him.

And so it was that, after the meal that night, Futoshi knew what he needed to do. He cared about the others _so much,_ even if the others thought he was beneath them. He just wanted them to be happy. He was willing to do whatever it took to achieve that. And ultimately, that meant he had to stop worrying so much about himself.

For the others to be happy, his part was simple:

— He had to smile and laugh and pretend to be jolly.

— He had to be insulted and mocked and just tolerate it for their pleasure.

— And he had to accept that he'd never be allowed to change himself or find someone else to be close to in the way the others had, because he clearly wasn't worthy of that.

Futoshi wants everyone to be happy, so he does what he can every day. He keeps a placid smile on his face as much as he can. He plays his part.

These days, he only cries when he's alone.


End file.
